Hey folks

Just a short blog as I haven't got any more pictures to put on the site....I neeeeed to get a camera that doesn't eat batteries like I eat green leaves.

Snow fell for the first time yesterday but it did not stay. The weather is a little bit chillier but nothing like what they had in Sask. today. It was darn cold.....-15 and that was as cold as it was here after the Huskies lost another close one to Laval in the Vanier Cup. I watched it on the sling box that Mark has set up for me here. Good to know that you can keep up to date with what is happening in Canada.

Have made contact with the Chinese teachers of English. We had a pizza night at the Canadian and renamed it the Faculty Club so that they feel welcome there. One suggestion was that since there was an open desk at the Chinese staff room ( in another building) that someone should go over there and set up shop. Guess who....and I made them listen to Big Black Horse and a Cherry Tree WOOOO HOOOOO...the theme song of the Canadian English teachers....so now we are on the same page as far as music goes....so to speak....Don't know how things will work out but doesn't seem to make any sense at all to have the two English departments in separate buildings....guess that's why that decision is made by some administration person.

Went out Friday night....we had a do at the other school CIS (Canadian Internation School). Theirs is brand new....what nice rooms and tastefully decorated. We drank a few beers and had a lot of laughs. I stayed overnight at Susan and John's place..they were with me on the trip to Xi'an..and the Terra Cotta warriors. We are trying to set up another trip....There is one to Harbin?? to see the Ice Sculptures and also there is a tour of the Olympic facilities as they are tight now....many are almost completed.

Also have completed my shopping for Christmas...first time ever I think I was done in NOVEMBER.......... as most of you realize I leave it until quite late.

Finally have my webcam and it actually works...funny thing. I installed it and couldn't get a picture on it. Stephen comes down and asks where is the eye for the camera...as if I would know. Then he moved part of the camera to expose the eye that I could not find....I told you I was not a computer guy....had a good laugh over that.

Survived all of the exams and stuff. I think the students get their marks on Monday and they will probably come running ......if they are not what they think they should be....WooHoo....no different than any kids all over the world. Have had to confiscate about 6 cell phones or MP3 players in my class....kids are text messaging each other or listening to music....and in MY class...you know the real interesting one....one girl was in a panic to have hers for the weekend so I was able to get her to write out my name in Chinese characters about 6 feet high....have the paper taped to my bedroom wall....kinda looks cool....she got her cell phone back and said she won't let that happen again?????

We are having a Christmas party...early. Jennifer and Angela have set up a tree in their room. I think I will have to put a contribution on it just to get into the Christmas spirit. We get the weekend of Christmas off and then it is back to school. Some people are going away for the weekend and others will be going away on the New years weekend. Don't know what I will be doing yet.

Have a light ( actually 2) for my bike so that I can see where I am going after dark...first thing after turning it on...hit a hole in the road...laughed like hell.... got a lot better after that. Saw an interesting thing today...a guy had somehow permanently attached mitts to the handlebars of his motorcycle so that he could just hop on the bike and put his hands in the mitts...when he gets off, the mitts are not having to be looked after.

My room looks like a sporting goods shop...three sets of golf clubs, my bike, a badminton racquet and table tennis racquet and gym shorts, running shoes kind of hanging around. Found out that you have to substitute your golf equipment (set) for one of your checked luggage if you want to take it back so that means that you have to use it almost as a suitcase. Oh well, guess we will just have to pack it to the hilt. Also will have to get a hardcover for my bike if I want to bring it back to Canada or I can put it in a carry on bag and then sign a release that absolves Air Canada of any damage...think I will look for a Hard Bike Case.

Bob and I are getting to be like some married couples....we don't seem to communicate too well. One week our fridge has nothing in it....then.....he went out and bought bananas and mandarin oranges and milk and I did exactly the same thing.....oh yeah and each of us bought cookies....at least the cookies were different.

The staff here is getting a little cheesed off with the financial people here....they have paid us for three months of teaching (and we have taught for 3 months) but they want us to pay them back one month's salary. We are having a meeting on Monday to find out what they do in China to make their system work so well...hahahaha.

May try to get to the Opera next weekend....Friday or Saturday....we are going to have a golf game on Sunday if the weather stays good....the CIS versus the BCCSC...we are going to call it the Jockstrap Open I think..Bob is looking after the bookings etc....match play....sort of know what that is, but we will see who the champions are after the weekend.

Had the official opening of the school....the 10th anniversary kick off...in November...our MP from Canada was brutal....I wrote my MP about it...she talked about 1000 metres above the student's heads and went on for about 25 minutes too long. the entertainment was ok. The Canadian teachers got into it with some clapping and moving around....you should have seen the students. It was as if we weren't supposed to enjoy ourselves..we were sitting on the bleachers at the back and in one solid mass, the back of their heads...all black, turned to expose their faces to see what the Canadians were doing.....it was like night and then day....we laughed about that.

Have been watching some Forrest Gump in my English class ...they do a movie review....and listen to some English....works for me....we will be doing another one in a week's time but with a theme of driving...kids need to do a lot of writing...one weakness exposed in the tests....so we try to get them to do things that they are interested in.....

Have decided to find a new maschocist...I mean masseur....these guys have just been wicked on my lower legs...my calf muscles just about disown me as they grab and wrestle with them...I tried to tell them to only do the upper body but they don't seem to understand....They certainly have been able to cause some things to move in my neck and shoulder and lower back...man are they tough.

Enough...I am babbling now. I am going to shave...head and face and have a shower and get to bed early maybe for once. I have all my correcting up to date so I feel good about this week.. that may be dangerous.

Pictures and explanation

Just a whole bunch of pictures about some stuff here. First one is me holding the pots used to hold a bunch of dumplings that we had at a rstaurant in Xi'an....me doing my imitation of Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid on the wall there and then me and Mr Liu and Don outside one of the temples I think.....

Don an Eve went to a musical display with water shooting storeys high. The light show and the water display were phenomenal. Eric and I with our Muslim hats in the cab coming home....he is a very funny taxi driver. We have a couple of drivers that we choose most of the time......Eric is the one we used here to pick us up at the airport.
The Wild Goose pagoda in the background if you can see it.....my camaera was acting up...this was a hand sculpture in front of the pagoda.
The Terra Cotta warriors as they stand in the stadium....quite a sight.
Apparently there was a fellow who dressed up as one of them and jumped into the pit and had a couple of his friends take pictures. the guards couldn't find him as he would stand perfectly still took about 1/2 hour to find him.

Bob and Chris taking a break after the skating in Beijing....they are holding up the boards In front of a Terra Cotta warrior in a glass case.
A monk....just before I got there he had his picture taken with a couple of women
A picture in the men's washroom at the skating venue....the picture....Emanuel Sandhu and there were a lot of others there.....I guess there is motivating going on at all times...
This is a small avenue down in the Muslim section of Xi'an....it was plugged with vendors and people bartering and just window shopping.....bikes and motorcycles rountinely go up and down the street.

That's it...for now. Lots of pictures so it was hard to pick the ones that would be of interest....

Take care

Xi'an

Well, it is officially winter (as an old quarterback Ron Lancaster would say) in Saskatchewan. After the Riders are out of the playoffs, it is official...and we have had some early winters...watched part of the game live but had to do some student interviews so didn't see the final part...guess it wasn't pretty...another year....again....Go Huskies

Spent last week or two doing some evalution so could not do a lot.

Have been able to phone home and am keeping up with the news there. Mark is going to Oklahoma...... and Jennifer is going to have a child.....is there a song or something in there....glad that all seems well on the home front....

I think I have my Christmas shopping done.....get out.....well you have to or it wouldn't get back in time...take a bit of a time to get there......so much for me wandering around on Christmas afternoon watching the look of panic onn the faces of people who had forgot until the last minute....including me sometimes...

Spent last week on a holiday excursion into the soutwest of China....to see the 8th wonder of the world..found in 1972... the remnants of a grave and historical record of the Terra Cotta warrior so Xi'an....it was incredible.....

We travelled down by overnight train..that way we didn't waste the viewing time....but we did waste a little time in the bar, I blame it on our tour guide ....she talked them into letting us stay there....it was there overnioght accomodationsas well as a dining car.....seems they have a dining car that serves refreshments......reputations being what they are, we had to close the place down at 12:00...we sang and drank and told stories....me, being the westerner had to hold up the whole left side of Canada.....and it is getting to be tough show.......but I was able to impress the peanut gallery with my ability to catch peanuts tossed into the air.....11 straight until I ran out of peanuts.....but a very good time and some good memories.

Got off the train, met our guide and were taken to our hotel.....a magnificent one...bathroom the with separate shower and tub....with a glass partition between the functioning part and the shower/tub .....interesting plan.....we had breakfast there and man did we (I) eat....it was a western and I mean western style breakfast...with real bacon, toast, butter, eggs, croissants, jam, fruit, yogurt, and a sponge pudding (I had 4 helpings)..I was so stuffed that I had trouble eating dinner.....my room mate was a young man going to Yale university and he had two other companions, a boy and and girl also going to Yale....the guy was from Fargo North
Dakota so he actually knew where Sask was...so I was able to be with the intellectuals that night.

Don and Eve and I got our bikes...hers had a bent back wheel and the suspension well it was not...there is a picture of a grandpa and his grand daughter having lunch.....also a picture of a tenement house.....they are all over the place and ther are many many people living in them...unenviable living conditions...and there are many worse...notice the barbe and then the butchers behind the walls...you will often see several of one kind of thing in a row....good old capitalism....the pictures are a little blurry....could blame it on the pollution but that would be misplcacing it.....don't know what the dickens happens....

We proceeded to the wall that divides the outer city from the inner city although with the size of it now it is mainly a tourist attraction...but it is impressive....it is a complete wall and is about 13 km around...I did get a few pictures but they are somewhat blurry...don't know why....some good ones though...will try to strategically place them....rented a bike and then proceeded to travel on top of the wall for about 1/2 an hour taking some shots and enjoying the views

.....Don and Eve and many of our teaching crew from to the other place (CIS) joined as well....interesting

The afternoon meal was very good, Chinese food and I couldn't eat it all as I had pigged out in the morning.....oh well, I will carry that burden too...The afternoon was spent going to the Terra Cotta museum....took about an hour to get there and we had about three hours there...some very spectacular pottery of the warriors....they were built over several decades and then painted and stored c/w spears as the emperor thought that in the next life they would be there to fight alongside him...he and his descendants ruled with an iron hand and when the other tribes finally rebelled, they came a destroyed the whole she...bang as well as taking all the weapons....they have not uncovered them all and will not until the technology is perfected that will allow the rest of the warriors (and I think there may be over 3000 to be unearthed) to be displayed so that they are not breaking down under the air and pollution, etc...I took a couple of photos but got more in a deck of cards....funny thing..they sell fake warriors all along the pathways....Eve bought the first set and paid 50 and we thought not bad, then I bought the

same set for 30 and thought wow what a bargainer....then someone else got a set for 20....and so on until we had a vendor trying to sell us one for 5.....got back and Kirsten said that one of their bus trips, someone was able to get it for 2 and a half...aaaaah good old private enterprise....got to love the picture to the Terra Cotta emperor....may look somewhat familiar....

Came back to supper and had a good one....lots of different dumpling....savoured them all..so many different types...all with a chaser of beer...Don and Eve and a few others went to watch a spectacular water show to music with showers of water shooting up as high as big buildings all choreographed to music....I stayed and went to the Habana club and had a couple of drinks with our tour guideand danced a couple of dances...the band was terrible but the inbetween music was good...the tour guide put the singers to shame when they came out on the floor to dance.....she had all the moves and more....I kind of sat back and watched...we left early as they couldn't sing to save their soul.....a very rich place...spa was 480 rmb...about 60 bucks.....one of the american ladies had the oil treatment...

The next day, we checked out and went to the Wild Goose Pagoda...it is just a temple...not quite the same...they seem to erect monuments for any reason....apparently a wild goose died while dying overhead and the monks wanted to remember it...some other folklore....so the Pagoda was erected......some very interesting shots there......then we went to the 2nd largest museum in China..the largest being in Beijing.....and then Xi'an will open a new one that will be the biggest soon....full of artifacts from various dynasties..our tour guide, was excellent, hew would give us information and then let us go on our own....and always seemed to know how much time to allow...

Afternoon we went to the muslim section of town where you can bargain.....adn I tried to get a picture of the sign ...and did....and then got separated from the group....I knew where I had to be by 5 o'clock so off I wandered...... guide from Xi'an was able to locate me after the otheres had gone to the mosque...I missed that part...I think he might habve been a little worried that I might not turn up again....Eve said that they didn't even miss me ....until the end...and then they wondered where the PD was...Prairie Dog....bought a few little knick knacks...don't know how I will get them home...maybe just have to leave them here....got a couple of Muslim hats....funny story...later...everybody bought something....even just dried fruit....one or two guys were cutting out profiles of people with small scissors...one guy even got the smoke rising from Mike's cigarette..an interesting place....I got one done for 5 and only had a fifty...when he handed me the money there was a little kid right by my pantleg....money please!!!!! and no matter what direction I stood, she would be right in front....there were many like that.....apparently some are actually owned by the local mafia....and are looked after.

Ride back to the airport and our local guide got us right in and left...silly me, I had a multipurpose tool pliers in my luggage..thought I could take them in my knapsack.....not...ended up having to go through checkout again and stowing the backpack underneath.....uneventful flight except for two things.....Big Black Horse and aCherry Tree were on one of the music channels and I was rocking to the music....much to the amazement of my two Chinese women sitting to my right...and I and Eve managed to correct several sets of exams on the hour flight....

My luggage came through very quickly and we booked Eric as our cab driver.....I showed him my two muslim hats and he started talking some sort of Pakastani so I put a hat on him, I put the other one on and Eve took a picture of us both....it was funny.....we were laughing hard....he is quite a character.....I told him could use my hats if he wanted to try to get some extra business..got home at about 10:30 and got to sleep about midnight...talked with Merle and Jennifer before I hit the hay.....

A very good and productive weekend with many memories... I will take some time on my next blog and just put a lot of pictures with some explanations with them...til then...don't try this kids, this is Ross W. Griswald..catch ya later dudes.